Most writers know the sting of criticism. We know it's going to come. When we believe in our writing, we also want to believe in everything we've written. Historical fiction novelist Deborah Swift has talked here about the importance of developing a thick skin. As avant-garde blackly comic crime author Aliya Whiteley discovered, though, that no matter how good a writer you are, you need to be open to criticism. You can be a good writer and still need to change what you're currently writing:
Before I was a crime writer I was a sci-fi writer. Before that, when my first novella was published, I was an experimental writer. And before that I was a writer of terrible romances.
I'm glad to say this romantic claptrap stage did not last long, but it did give birth to three particularly ugly manuscripts which I'm determined to keep locked up in a cupboard forever-more. But writing terrible romances taught me a lot about pace, and structure, and character; the form of the romance novel is not flexible, so I learned the craft of telling a story in which the hero must kiss the heroine by chapter two and they have to have moved on to at least third base by the end of novel, while having some sort of reason to keep bumping into each other that doesn't overshadow the kissie bits.
One of these horrible efforts actually made it to the acceptance stage. Caught By The Cougar (I told you it was terrible) got picked up by a brand new E-Book publisher back in the days when nobody bought E-Books. And a professional editor got her mitts on my ugly baby. She ripped it to shreds, and rightly so, but boy, did it hurt. I seriously considered ignoring her thousands of comments - after all, I had written a book and someone was going to publish it, so it had to be brilliant already, right? - but in the end, common sense overcame my ego and I got down to the business of making all my passive sentences active, and taking out most of the awful adverbs, and tightening up the pace where it flagged, and slowing it down when the hero and heroine got to the making out stage. I learned a huge amount from that experience, and I am undoubtedly a better writer because of it. I spent months making changes, and at the end of it, I had a book that wasn't bad. It still wasn't good, but it wasn't bad. Of course, my careful editing took so long that by the time I returned the manuscript the E-publisher had already folded.
When someone really criticises your baby, you want to put your hands over your ears and pretend that they're an idiot who didn't understand the first thing about your writing. But learning to be open to criticism and to act on it when necessary - this is what turns an amateur into a professional, I think. It's a painful process. But I'm glad I went through it.
I'm also glad it was never published. But that's a retrospective gladness.
Aliya Whiteley
Aliya Whiteley is the author of Three Things About Me and Light Reading, both also available in the US after-market. Light Reading is also available on Kindle.
Great post, and it's very true. It's hard to receive criticism, and sometimes it takes a few days to digest what the person said isn't working about your baby. Not all criticism is right, but when it is, and you change things, you can have a much better product when it comes out. Thank you for this post. :)
ReplyDeleteJeez, but the world does need Caught by the Cougar. Doesn't it?
ReplyDeleteI'm sure there's still a market for it on Kindle.
I'd no idea you'd done so much, Aliya! Taking criticism is terribly hard, I agree, especially when it's that really brilliant bit - the bit that people will quote for generations to come; the bit that was sheer genius - that you are told must be removed. But if it comes from someone you really trust, as Cherie says, it can be such a help (after you've recovered from the initial pain, of course).
ReplyDeleteAliya,
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for this post. As always, your frankness and slanted humor are both helpful and entertaining.
@Cherie - I would say that kind of criticism is a bitter pill that tastes awful but gets you healthy, but I like the taste of bitter pills most of the time....
@Tim - It might interest you to know that the first title I gave to this post was not, "You're not Always Brilliant." It was, "You're not Always Jack Vance."
@Frances - Nothing stings quite as much as being told your best writing is suitable only for your own eyes. :-/ But, in the end, sometimes it's true...
I agree being open to criticism is important it helps growth as a writer. thanks for posting this C.N.
ReplyDeletegreat, post, CN! And she's right, learning to be open to criticism is essential to improvement. Of course, you also have to make sure to get more than one opinion~ Thanks! :o) <3
ReplyDelete@Summer and Leigh - I'm glad you both appreciated this post, too!
ReplyDeleteFor me part of what was really important about reading this from Aliya was that this series has overall stressed the importance of persistence and writing for yourself as ways to climb up out of the metaphorical dumps. Aliya's story reminds me that, sometimes, you need to actually respond.
It's not always the publishing industry or your editors who need to change.
Sometimes it's you.
There's a lot to be said for having your work shredded before it's too late. At some point, every writer needs to embrace harsh realities of where their writing sucks...
ReplyDeleteShe's so right, but this is so hard to remember.
ReplyDeletebethfred.com
Awesome post!
ReplyDeleteLearning how to take criticism was one of the hardest things when I was getting started. I'm better now, but in the beginning, the crits were hard to take in. My very first workshop, I submitted the earliest chapters of the book that's now coming out in July, and one of my fellow workshoppers ripped it to shreds. TO SHREDS. I was so depressed I didn't leave the house for 2 days.
But 2 1/2 years later, he's one of my best friends, and if not for him and other crits like his, I wouldn't have gotten better.
One of the first things i was told in my obligatory creative writing class in college was to leave your ego at the door, and it was the most important lesson i took out of the whole year.
ReplyDeleteSimilarly, the harshest critic of my first manuscript has told me that you learn more from writing your failed novels yourself than you do from a thousand people's feedback, and i'm beginning to see more and more that it is true.
I fear that we all start young and dumb and thinking we are the greatest writers who ever lived, and then we learn for the next 20 years that we are shit but we are getting better. It's a long process, but i hope i can come out the other side better for it!
@Bridget - And sometimes our biggest weakness is something pretty big. Took me a long time to realize I can't write mysteries worth a darn.
ReplyDelete@Beth - Isn't that the kicker? There's knowing, and there's remembering. Two very different things. lol
@Jennifer - That's awesome. I've talked before about my editor mom helping my writing develop. Goodness, there were manuscripts that came back with so much red I couldn't even see what I'd written, and some of our arguments remain family legends. But I would definitely be a fraction of the writer I am today without that.
@Luke - I think that's a very wise perspective, and fairly accurate as to my own growth and development!
I have discovered with my own writing that having "thick skin" isn't the answer. I don't need to armor myself against the feedback I've requested. I need to be accepting and figure out what I can use. I grow more as a writer when people are focused on my writing, not on my feelings.
ReplyDeleteAck; is that's cynical? Hmm, I've let my self editor roam free in my finished works lately.
A good post Aliya. Thanks for sharing your journey.
@nevets: I'm sending the excerpt. Thanks for volunteering your expertise.
........dhole
@Donna - It doesn't sound cynical to me. It sounds pretty mature. Maybe I'm the cynical one...
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